The Swedish mining company LKAB announced on Thursday that it had found a large deposit of rare earths. However, it is still unclear to what extent European industry will benefit from this.
“Rare earths” are various metals that have special chemical properties. This is what makes them so important for the production of technical devices such as smartphones. There are also rare earths in Germany, but the deposits are so small that mining them would not be worthwhile.
It has now become known that the largest deposit in Europe to date has been found in the northern Swedish city of Kiruna: one million tons. However, the decisive factor will be how quickly the earth can be mined, explains SZ correspondent Björn Finke.
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Editor’s note: In the following it is mentioned that rare earths are needed for the production of batteries. In fact, they are required for the production of electric motors. Please excuse the mistake.